Today we celebrate the feast of our Lady of Mt. Carmel. Today’s Gospel reminds us that if we want to want to know God the Father, we must come to know the Son and I know of no better way to come to know the Son than through his Mother, Mary. For Carmelites, for whom today is a special feast, Mary is the one who points most clearly to Christ. Thus we today can say with the Carmelites, that if we want to come to enter into a relationship with our Heavenly Father we must turn to our Spiritual Mother and ask her to lead us to her Son who will lead us to the Father. When we deepen our relationship with our Mother we deepen our relationship with Christ and thus are invited into the love of the Trinity.

It is because of our Mother Mary that we can say with the psalmist today “the Lord will not abandon His people.” On the Cross, immediately before His death, Our Lord gave His mother to the Church to be our Mother. Just before he passed to be seated at the right hand of the Father, our Lord left us His mother so that we would not be orphans but would have the motherly care we need to be brought to the spiritual maturity required for eternal life. Our Blessed Mother always leads us to Christ and assists us through her intercession. I think Fulton Sheen summarized the importance of a relationship with our Blessed Mother with respect to today’s Gospel best when he said Mary “is more like a magnifying glass; she intensifies our love of her son and makes our prayers more bright and burning.”[1]

As we celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel today let us turn to our Blessed Mother and ask her to lead us into an ever-deeper relationship with her Son. Let us renew our devotion to our Spiritual Mother and allow her to lead us into a deeper relationship with Her Son who will lead us to life in the Trinity.